HOT SPRINGS — An Arkansas State Police trooper who fatally shot a suspect last month in Royal during a struggle for the trooper’s gun after a high-speed chase was justified in his use of deadly force, Garland County prosecutor Michelle Lawrence said Friday.
Trooper 1st Class Ryan Wingo “had no choice but to use deadly force in his defense” during the June 2 encounter with Andrew Kemp Jr., 34, of Mountain Pine, who had fled from Wingo on a motorcycle that afternoon, Lawrence told The Sentinel-Record.
The state police had provided Lawrence with an investigative file of the incident and “after a thorough review” she concluded that Wingo was justified and has since sent a letter to state police special agent James Avant, “who was the investigator on the matter,” informing him of her decision, she said.
Wingo, a six-year veteran of the state police, has been on administrative leave with pay pending a ruling in the matter. Lawrence noted that he had not returned to duty as of Friday because he is still recovering from injuries suffered during the struggle with Kemp.
“The day it happened, we went out to the scene,” Lawrence said. “Because it’s just helpful to see the scene with your own eyes.” Kemp reportedly fled on foot into some woods after the motorcycle pursuit, which began shortly after 12:30 p.m. and ended in the 600 block of Woodview Lane in Royal, state police stated in a news release the day after the incident.
At the scene, Wingo’s vehicle and Kemp’s motorcycle were there, Lawrence said, noting, “You could tell there had been some type of traffic incident, some type of chase.” She said she went into the trees where Kemp’s body was. It was “very clear there was some kind of scuffle that had taken place.” Part of the case file that state police provided Lawrence included footage from the camera in Wingo’s car, “so you actually saw the entire chase, which was quite some time,” she said. “Trooper Wingo was on Wacaster Hill and Kemp came by on his motorcycle very fast so [Wingo] activated his lights to make a traffic stop, and the chase ended where [Kemp] was found.” During the chase Kemp was “taunting” Wingo, she said, “using finger signs, s c re a m i n g a n d ye l l i n g throughout the chase. You could see that. You could see the fence they came to [at the end of Woodview] and see in the footage from the vehicle that Kemp jumped from his motorcycle and squeezed through a gate.” Lawrence said she didn’t know if Wingo had a body camera or if it was not activated, but “you could hear what was going on from the car video. … You could the entire struggle from the car. It was a very lengthy struggle. We timed it, and it was a little over three minutes.” According to Wingo’s statement, which was corroborated by the audio, she said, he tried to use his Taser on Kemp and “actually Tased himself during the struggle. He was able to get the Taser from him, and then you continue to hear this struggle between the two of them. You could hear two people, the breathing. And at some point in time, Kemp attempted to take Wingo’s gun and you can hear Trooper Wingo say, ‘Give me my gun,’ and you can hear the voice of Win-go escalate as it progressed, when he saw where it was going.” She said Wingo kept yelling, “‘Put your hands behind your back’ and ‘Stop! Stop! Stop!’ and then you hear it go silent.” Lawrence noted that she was there when officers searched Kemp’s body and found a loaded firearm in his boot.
“It was very clear from what I could see and what I could hear that [Kemp] was not going to give up without a fight and was going to use deadly force on Trooper Wingo, who had no choice but to use deadly force in his defense,” she said.